“I dinna ken what she could learn, for my part,” said Miss Janet, affectionately, “nor how she could weel be better or bonnier, for a’body can see the genty lady-breeding Miss Menie’s got; and there’s naebody atween this and the hills needs to be telt o’ the kind heart and the pleasant tongue, and the face that every creature’s blithe to see; and I’m sure I never heard a voice like her for singing; and a’ the grand tunes she can play, and draw landscapes, and work ony kind o’ bonnie thing you like to mention. Didna you draw a likeness o’ Jenny, Miss Menie, my dear? And I’m sure yon view you took frae the tap o’ our hill is just the very place itsel--as natural as can be; and, for my part, Mrs Laurie, I dinna ken what mortal could desire for her mair.” Mrs Laurie smiled; but the mother was not displeased, though she did think it possible still to add to Menie’s acquirements, if not to her excellence; and Menie herself went off laughing and blushing, fully resolved in her own mind to destroy forthwith that likeness wherein poor Jenny’s “high shouther” figured with an emphasis and distinctness extremely annoying to the baffled artist, whose pencil ran away with her very often in these same much-commended drawings, and who was sadly puzzled in most cases how to make two sides of anything alike. And Menie knew her tunes were anything but grand, her landscapes not at all remarkable for truth--yet Menie was by no means distressed by Miss Janet’s simple-hearted praise. The evening was spent in much talk of the departure. July Home had followed her aunt, and sat in reverential silence listening to the conversation, and making a hundred little confidential communications of her own opinion to Menie, which Menie had some trouble in reporting for the general good. It was nine o’clock of the moonlight April night when the farmer of Crofthill came to escort his “womankind” home. The clear silent radiance darkened the distant hills, even while it lent a silver outline to their wakeful guardian range, and Menie came in a little saddened from the gate, where the father of her betrothed had grasped her hand so closely in his good-night. “No mony mair good-nights now,” said John Home. “I’ll no get up my heart the morn, though it is the first day of summer. You should have slipped up the hill the night to gather the dew in the morning, May; but I’ll learn to think the May mornings darker than they used to be, when your ain month takes my bonnie lassie from Burnside. Weel, weel, ane’s loss is anither’s gain; but I grudge you to London smoke, and London crowds. You must mind, May, my woman, and kept your hame heart.”